Deuteronomy 13:4 You shall walk after the Lord your God and fear him and keep his commandments and obey his voice, and you shall serve him and hold fast to him.

Gosh, y’all. I’m thinking that this is one of the best scriptures in the whole of the Bible. It wreaks of God putting us in our place, which hopefully we will remain in every day of our lives. Humility, the spiritual smack down, is the classic “Thanks, I needed that.” moment that you young people won’t even remember but those my age will. It was an ad (http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=SB8ucoNek2g) campaign – and a young John Goodman, haha. But anyway, yes,”God, thanks, I needed that.”

God takes our actions seriously. He took them so seriously that He incarnated and suffered a hideous death just to have relationship with us. He had choices. He had every choice that ever existed. And He chose to make the rules the way the rules are, knowing full well what it would cost Him. And though we can play mental games and jump through mental hoops of our own creation, we are not going to change the truth. We just aren’t. Society will morph the truth and fight against the truth and pretend that the truth isn’t the truth. Society will make things relative, not absolute. But God? God is not amused. And God doesn’t change. Ever. HE endured more punishment for our sins than we have to endure. So for us to pretend that our sin isn’t sin, for us to pretend that we can get away with disobedience without owning it, because societal morals and opinions have “evolved” is ridiculous.

Stop. Look at the cross. And then tell yourself that your sin doesn’t matter and God loves you anyway. Does He? Absolutely. Does He look the other way when we sin? Umm, heck no. No. He doesn’t look the other way. He owned it, in the tearing of His own skin, in the thorns piercing his skull, in the nails hammered through His flesh and bones.

Now we must own it. Don’t pretend. Don’t call it a zero or even a number 2 sin if it’s an 8. Receive forgiveness for an 8, not a 2, so that you can appreciate His sacrifice to the fullest and that will, in turn, bring you more and more freedom. It is for US that we must own our sin so that we can be free of it. That is what this life is all about! Freedom! Freedom cannot happen unless we first are willing to live in truth. Telling ourselves the truth, knowing the truth, seeking the truth is crucial to joy and contentment.

Take away: It is so critical to first know the truth by knowing God, through the Holy Spirit and through the Word, and by seeking His input for our lives, and then to own the truth of our own sin so that we can receive forgiveness and understand who we are and who we are not- and realize who He is and who He is not. Freedom comes from living in the truth and receiving His grace and mercy.

Prayer: Father, please help me to live in truth, tell myself the truth, and own the truth about myself and my own sin. Please humble me to the core of my being. I want to live in Your freedom and I know the way to freedom is through truth and forgiveness and obedience and through serving You. Draw me close, please.